I'm in LOVE! / My kingdom for a full night's sleep

Today I have two post titles, which really have nothing to do with each other. The second was thought up while I was awake at 3:30 am, nursing Owen for what seemed like the 50th time. He is driving me crazy! Last night, he fell asleep around 10:30. I, of course, had to stay up another half hour to knit on my Knitty Gritty sweater because I wanted to finish the first sleeve and get it attached to the body (which I did). I finally got to sleep around 11:30. The little parasite decided he was starving at 12:30, 1:30, 3:30, 4:30, 6:30 & 7:30. Talk about not getting any kind of deep sleep whatsoever! My pediatrician recommended just letting him cry for a few nights and he'd get the picture, but I just can't withhold food from my child! I mean, what if he really is hungry? What if he's going through a growth spurt? I'm not going to let him lay there miserable with a grumbling tummy... I know these days will pass, and in the meantime, I have plenty of Diet Coke in the fridge to get me through the next day.

I can't remember the last time I went to bed in the evening and slept a deep, restful, uninterrupted sleep until the alarm went off in the morning. It was probably before I had Sydney. It is slightly easier dealing with the sleep deprivation this time around, probably because I've been somewhat sleep deprived for almost three years. It makes me think of a Ny-Quil commercial where the slogan was "It will make you sleep like you did before you had kids" and it shows a couple falling back into a cushy bed made up with fluffy white pillows and a huge down comforter. And we're thinking of having another baby...call us crazy.

As for the first title, that came about from my delight when I stumbled bleary-eyed into the living room this morning and saw a little white box sitting by the front door. My ball winder and swift came in the mail yesterday! I got home too late last night to try it out then, but I set it up this morning. Here it is in all its glory:


And here is the first beautiful ball I wound:


Isn't it lovely? This thing rocks - it is going to save me so much time. I can't believe I've never used one before! They always looked too scary to me in the LYS, and I didn't want to look like a total idiot trying to figure out how to use it in front of all the other knitters. I feel stupid now, because it is pretty darn easy. I especially love the brand name of the swift - the "K.M. All-Powerful Reeling Machine". I bow to you, All-Powerful One. So long, yarn barf! Now I just have to figure out how to keep my daughter from breaking it...


This is my son's new favorite position. He used to want us to hold him all the time. Now he wants to lay on the floor and roll around all the time. He will stay down there for hours! I think it's because he has just started rolling over from back to stomach, and he wants to practice, practice, practice. He now has a little bald spot on the back of his head where he's rubbed all the hair off on the carpet. Sydney, of course, likes to jump towards him and land as close as she can to his head without actually stepping on it. This bothers me a little bit (she has never really hurt him, but there's a first time for everything...) but it makes her father absolutely apoplectic. He rants and raves at her, which of course eggs her on.

Playgroup is at our house on Friday morning, which means I'm going to have to clean. The state of the house at the morning is bordering on uninhabitable. In fact, I'd better get started if I'm going to have any hope of finishing in time...

Stash organization

Yesterday, I got my stash a bit more organized. The six loads of laundry my husband did this weekend, however, although folded, are still sitting on the dining room table, waiting to be put away. I have pictures of both, but Blogger refuses to upload them. Perhaps it's a sign that I don't need to display pictures of laundry here.

In a way, it's great to have a bunch of clothes in the middle of the dining room. When Owen destroys another outfit via spit-up or diaper explosion, I can just run to the dining room to grab a fresh one instead of sprinting upstairs while hoping Sydney doesn't kill him while I'm gone. (Okay, I don't give her enough credit - she has only made him cry three times in nearly five months. Pretty good for a two-year-old.) After lounging around in my pajamas until noon (while watching soaps and eating bonbons, of course), I don't have to drag the kids upstairs to get dressed - my wardrobe is right at hand, in the middle of the dining room! Of course, we can't ever have people over, and I'm quite embarrased whenever anyone comes to the door, but so far the positives have outweighed the negatives enough that I haven't been motivated to lug it all upstairs and put it away. It's just going to get dirty again and go down to the basement, anyway, right?

But I digress... Owen miraculously took a two-and-a-half hour nap yesterday (he hardly slept on Sunday, so he made up for lost time), and I was able to organize my to-be-completed projects in a nifty little spreadsheet - stash.xls. I currently have three projects on needles. I have another 9 unstarted projects w/ designated patterns and yarn. I have 2 unstarted projects w/ yarn purchased and clear designs (designed by me) in mind. I have 3 miscellaneous balls of yarn that I bought to swatch and see if they inspired me at all. Since it doesn't seem like enough planning ahead to only have projects for the next three years, I went to Knit Picks and ordered yarn for a bunch of Christmas presents and a scarf I want to design as well as a ball to swatch and see if it will work for Hopeful. That's what I get for surfing the archives at Knitty! I have my Christmas list 90% covered now. We'll see if I can actually get all the stuff knitted in time. I'm fast, but I'm also easily distracted by new yarn/projects.

The NE Knitting Mommies met last night and we had three new members join us. It is so much fun to see what everyone is working on (and last night somebody ELSE made yarn barf - not me!). This one hasn't been started yet, but here is the project I can't wait to see... I started on one of my many Xmas gifts, so I can't post any progress pictures here. You'll just have to wait until January! I need to figure out some way to post pics w/o giving anything away...

Nothing to see here...

DISCLAIMER: Today's entry is a boring one. I don't have any pictures. I don't really have any new knitting news to report. But, being the obsessed-with-blogging individual that I am, I feel compelled to write something anyway.

Actually, I do have some knitting news, I just can't share every detail since I'm not sure what's kosher and what's not as far as posting information on a design I want to try to get published. I'm pretty sure pictures are verboten, which is too bad since I'm almost done with the back of the sweater and it's turning out really cute. I'm knitting it in Plymouth Encore, which is not my favorite yarn but I chose it because of its machine washability (important with toddler clothes).

To those of you who are concerned with the fate of the cow sweater, yes, it's true - I am going to frog the whole thing and start from scratch. And no, I'm really not that upset about it because the cow had a few spots on it that I really wasn't happy with. I'm hoping that it will come out much better this time around. And it's so small that it knits up really fast. I'm going to make it much bigger this time so that Sydney doesn't grow out of it in two weeks.

It is finally raining here, which is very exciting. I have been getting lax with the watering and the rain will go a long way towards keeping my little garden alive. We got our first two tomatoes on Saturday and put them on some burgers - they were soooo yummy. It's just incredible how much more flavor home-grown tomatoes have compared to their store-bought counterparts. I am really looking forward to the peas and green beans that should be coming in a month or so.

We may be getting new neighbors soon. The house next door has been empty since we moved in. The sons of the former owner have been fixing it up and getting it ready to sell for over a year, and they finally put it on the market about a month ago. They were trying to sell it themselves, but didn't have too much luck. They hired a realtor about a week ago, and apparently got a bunch of offers right away. We haven't heard anything else, but the open house scheduled for yesterday was canceled and there were some people there for over an hour in the morning. Bill was peeking out the window at them, since we're very curious about who they might be. We keep wishing we had veto power - no barky dogs, younger with kids, preferably a husband who plays basketball and a wife who knits (or a wife who plays basketball and husband who knits, or gay couple who both knit and play basketball...). Apparently this couple was mid-30s, guy wearing Nikes (possibly an athletic type), woman pregnant (future kids). He thought they might pass muster. The houses are arranged such that we need to be friendly with our neighbors or things could be really miserable.

Tomorrow's headlines...how many projects can one knitter have in the queue before it becomes unreasonable?

Me? A designer?

[For those of you who can't read her shirt, it says "would somebody please teach me to knit?"]

I just completed my second original design, and here is my test knitter (don't I wish). It's going to be a little cardigan sweater w/ patch pockets that I'm hoping to figure out in time for Sydney to wear to school. I'm going to try submitting it to a magazine as well, if I can find any with the right deadlines. I really would like to become a published designer, although I don't think my husband is too thrilled about the amount of time it takes (I worked on the cardigan design for about 8 hours yesterday, and I only got one size done and the gauge needs to be readjusted). I have no desire to go back to the corporate world once the kids are in school, so I'm trying to figure out how to make my knitting pay at least a little bit.

In non-knitting news, this was the weekend of picnics, picnics, picnics! First we had Bill's company picnic on Friday afternoon. It was hot and the food was okay but not spectacular, but the best part was the big inflatable toys they had for the kids. It was the first time that Sydney was big and brave enough to really go nuts in the bouncy house, and go nuts she did! I forgot my camera, which I was really sad about because in this case, a picture really would be worth a thousand words. The girl who has been terrified of going down even short slides by herself was climbing up to the top of the 2-story inflatable slide (by herself) and sliding down like a little daredevil. It was so much fun to watch - watch being the key word! It was nice to not have to go with her for once. We got another parent's report on the slide experience, and it ended up with a giant wedgie. The only bad thing was that Sydney wanted us to "MOMMY, WATCH! MOMMY, WATCH!" the entire time she was jumping. No adult conversation for mommy or I'd have a hysterical toddler on my hands (and other parents, thinking she was hurt, looking at me and wondering why I wasn't rushing to her aid).

Yesterday we had a lovely family picnic with a bunch of our playgroup families. The weather wasn't too hot (for once) and the picnic shelter we rented was right next to a gigantic play structure and sandbox. Sydney again was pretty fearless on the slides and actually ate a fried chicken drumstick for lunch in addition to her Teddy Grahams. I was feeling like the worst mom in the world as the other kids sat down and ate, without complaint, things like fruit, veggies and pasta salad. One of the little boys kept trying to offer Sydney a rasberry, to which she screamed "NO, NO, NO, DON'T WANT IT! MOOOOOMMMMEEEEE!" This, of course, only egged him on...

Since I don't have any knitting pics for you today, I'll leave you with the reverse side of the first picture. Where did she get those curls? Good thing she got her chin dimple from my husband, or he'd think she was the milkman's kid.

Swag-o-rama

The mailman brought something other than junk mail yesterday. I was delighted to see a little box full of prezzies for myself sitting on the porch yesterday. Here's what was in it:


The Baby Knits book came at a fortuitous time since we just found out that good friends of ours are having a baby in March - yay! Now the tough decision as to what to make the new bambino.

Here is another WIP that I've finally gotten out of hiding long enough to photograph. This is what I work on late at night while waiting for the baby to go to sleep (or after he has gone to sleep, on those blissful occasions when this happens at a reasonable hour). It is another Knitty Gritty project, designed by the fabulous Jenna Adorno.


The bottom ribbed section is in Rowan All-Seasons Cotton and the top part is in GGH soft kid mohair. I LOVE working with the mohair - it is so soft and decadent. It is a bear to frog, though, so it's fortunate that this is all plain stockinette and hard to mess up. The wormy-looking things around the middle are I-cord beltloops that will eventually hold a grosgrain ribbon belt. We'll see if this actually fits me when I'm done - I made the largest size, but I am slowly losing the baby weight as I knit. I can't decide if that would be a good thing or a bad thing...

Since I love Jenna's designs so much, I've joined my first knit-along - of her Hopeful sweater (because I don't have an endless supply of projects lined up already). I decided that I was going to do this, however, because Jenna is donating 120% of the proceeds from the sweater pattern to the Susan Love foundation for breast cancer research. Breast cancer runs in both my family and my husband's (both of our grandmothers are survivors), so this cause means a lot to me both for myself and for my daughter. Now I am looking for the perfect pink yarn (since pink is the color of the cause) to knit it in.

And just in case anyone cares (I know you don't, but here it is anyway), this is what I had for breakfast this morning:


Can you tell I have too much time on my hands when the kids are both asleep?

Last night we went to new parent orientation at the preschool Sydney is going to start attending on Sept. 22. I have really been looking forward to having mornings somewhat to myself (one kid instead of two), and I know that's she's really going to thrive there. It is a Montessori school run by Franciscan nuns, and we know several people whose kids have gone there and raved about it. I didn't think I was going to have any trouble sending her off, since I feel very comfortable with the people she'll be around and the environment she'll be in. I have no concerns for her safety, but as the sister was talking about some of the things she'll be doing and what the procedures are for drop-off and pick-up, I found myself tearing up. It's the first time that Sydney will really be doing something totally separate from me - it will be entirely her own thing. She'll be doing activities and forming relationships that I haven't had a hand in (other than enrolling her in the school in the first place). It's her first big step away from me, and it's going to be more painful than I was anticipating. I can't wait to see how she'll do there, though. She is such a creative little girl, and she loves to construct/deconstruct everything she can get her hands on. Montessori will be the perfect environment for her, and this is a great Montessori school. (Disclaimer - both of my parents-in-law are former Montessori teachers, so we have strong feelings about the Montessori method in this family.)

Now that the oldest will soon be out of the house five mornings a week, I can concentrate my evil powers on the boy (insert evil laugh here).


Here is my little narcissist enjoying himself in the mirror. He just discovered this the other night, and it was so cute. He started cooing, squeaking and jumping up and down like a crazy person, all the while grinning like an idiot. Now we have a new trick in our books - when he's hysterical, we just need to stick him in front of the mirror to calm him down.

And what would this blog entry be without a teeny tiny baby sock picture?


Are you sick of these yet? I am, but I need my size 2 needles back so I'm going to have to finish this sock one way or another. The other one may just have to wait until I get back in a teeny tiny baby sock kinda mood.

I felt ya, dawg

Last night, I made my first attempt at needle felting. I think it turned out pretty nice, if a little lopsided! Here are the pics midway through (the petals are pretty well attached w/ the size 38 needle, but I still needed to do the center of the flower and the finishing work)


And here is the finished product, after adding the flower center and finishing with a smaller size 40 needle. I love it! It will be great for those rare occasions when I leave the house without a diaper bag or knitting bag.


I also managed to weave the ends in on the first pair of baby socks, and here they are on baby feet:


What you don't see in that picture is that he was screaming with rage at those socks. We'll see if he has that reaction every time I put them on him - they may have to go in the gallery of cute-but-unusable knitted objects.

I am going to be picture-happy today. First, a picture of the permanent state of our kitchen floor. This is what my daughter does while I neglect her for blogging or (god forbid) unloading the dishwasher. I'm too lazy to pick it up, so her "fresh pages" keep piling up. She's finally figuring out that she can draw more than one thing on each sheet of paper, so they don't pile up quite as quickly as they used to.


Here is a close-up of one of her adorable-if-slightly-psychotic drawings. Not bad for a two-year-old, huh?


Finally, a new idea of what to do with that poor, unfinished baby sock. Since baby toes are often one of the cutest parts on the baby, and they're always covered up, I propose a new invention - the toeless baby sock (and, yes, I know it's a little early in the season for the pumpkin pajamas, but I doubt this outfit will still fit him in October):


Am I a trendsetter or what? I am going to rip the toe out of the other sock and finish them up as baby ankle warmers, toeless foot warmers, what have you. Look for the finished results coming up soon...

And one last technical note - I changed my blogger settings so that anonymous comments can be made on my site. The simple explanation is that you don't have to log in to make a comment (so now anyone can do it - hint, hint...). But please, do leave your name (and Bill, I know you're reading this, so no obnoxious anonymous comments from you, please, my dear).

Thanks for reading!

My cow is turning into a FROG!

Well, I sewed the shoulder seam and knitted the collar on Sydney's cow sweater yesterday. Here is how it turned out (note the quarter used for scale). I don't know about your toddler, but mine has a gigantic head and a relatively big neck. I just don't think that collar is going to fit when it barely fits around my wrist! I am getting quite irritated with this pattern. I swatched and got gauge. I checked the gauge of the finished pieces when I blocked, and again last night just to see if I'd really screwed something up. My gauge is spot on! So, what the heck is going on? I also have issues with the size of the sleeve cuffs:


These came out super small. They might fit around her wrists, but I can't imagine trying to fit her hands through them (especially as she's struggling and yelling that they're "too tight, too tight!"). So, I'm going to frog it (unravel it, for those of you who aren't knitting lingo-savvy - and no, it's not an acronym that starts w/ the f-word, although at this point I think it should...) and start over, using the sweater pattern from The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns instead. I also measured a shirt that fits her the way I'd like the sweater to and I'll use those measurements instead of just assuming that the 2-4 size will fit her. It's amazing how much you learn from each project you do! Hopefully I'll be able to make the intarsia a little nicer this time around.

Well, it's time for my morning Diet Coke. My hubby went golfing before work this morning, and he's the one who usually makes sure Sydney stays asleep until a reasonable hour. Once she gets through the wee hours of the morning, she'll usually sleep in until 9 or so. Well, this morning I was woken from a dead sleep by screaming from her room, so as soon as I figured out where I was and where that horrible screeching noise was coming from, I rushed across the hall to try to calm her down before the baby woke up. I got her back to sleep, snuck out the door, and had one foot back in my bedroom when she started up again. After a couple more iterations of this back-and-forth, I finally brought her into our room where she promptly and happily fell asleep. Then the baby woke up to eat, and I had to get him changed and nursed without waking Sydney up - no easy feat. I tried to go back to sleep with one of them on either side of me, but it didn't really work with both of them kicking me and me trying to make sure neither of them woke up! Whew!

For the moment, the baby's still sleeping and Sydney is sitting on my lap making drawings of little egg people (heads with arms and legs but no bodies). The baby monitor is starting to snuffle, so my peaceful internet time is running out - I'd better publish before I perish!

We came, we knitted, we ate gelato...

The first meeting of the NE Knitting Mommies was a smashing success. We had two felted bags going, one in a cool lime green color and the other in a multicolored black-white-dk pink yarn. We had a gorgeous little baby sweater knitted in Berroco Plush (I think that's what it was...), the softest yarn you can imagine (the rest of us were fondling it all night). And here is what I made:



Yup, yarn barf. What a productive evening! I was stupid when packing my knitting bag, because I only brought one project which required hanks of yarn that have not yet been would into balls. I have a swift and ball winder on order from WEBS, and I wasn't going to use this yarn until I'd wound it with said swift and ball winder. I was not pleased when I sat down, opened up my bag, and realized what I'd done... At least I got gelato, a bear claw and some good gab to make me feel better. Thanks, ladies!

One of the things I was asked last night is how I can manage to be so productive with two small children at home. For those of you wondering the same thing, the answer is simple - neglect! My daughter spends more time in front of the television than she should (but it's all educational, so it's not so bad, right?), and my son dangles in his gigantic baby contraption:



That's what they're doing right now, while I blog, and I don't hear any crying. I mean, I don't beat them, I try to provide one enriching experience every other day or so (i.e. the zoo, the park, grammy's house), and I haven't yet farmed them out as child laborers, so I figure I'm doing an okay job of parenting!

That said, the boy is starting to squeak, so I'd better go rescue him. Hard to say what his big sister is doing to him right now!

My knittin' mommy wish list

I wish that...

...I could figure out how to knit while breastfeeding/reading Green Eggs & Ham for the 500th time/walking around the house with a screaming baby.

...I could make it through the day without some weird stain appearing on my clothing.

...I could get through the night without waking up at 3 am with the theme song from The Backyardigans stuck in my head.

...I could sleep through the night, period!

...I could teach my 2 year-old to knit so she'd stop trying to rip my knitting out of my hands.

...I could turn my head without getting a whiff of the baby barf that is permanently on my shoulder.

...I could get both the kids to sit quietly and patiently while I knit/blog/surf.

...Doritos and chocolate chip cookies had more nutritional value, because my daughter won't touch vegetables and has to be bribed to eat fruit!

...my kiddos would forever stay as loving, adorable and innocent as they are right now.

First meeting of the NE Knitting Mommies

The NE Portland Knitting Mommies will have their inaugural meeting tonight, from 7-9 pm, at Parisi's on Fremont at 46th. This is a group I've put together with some of my knitting playgroup mommy friends. We are welcoming non-mommies as well, but they'll have to put up with kid talk (since what else do we moms have to talk about but kids and knitting...). If you want to join us, drop me a line (my e-mail is listed in my profile). Here's to knitting, gelato and good conversation!

Sunday, busy Sunday

I'm not sure why, but it seems I got a lot done yesterday. I finally felted my little purple bag, and I'm delighted at how it turned out. It felted pretty fast (about 12 minutes) and it's just too cute. I can't wait to get the flower on it so I can take it out for a spin! Even my hubby was impressed - "Wow, you made that? It looks manufactured!" This felting thing is pretty darn cool. I have Felted Knits on hold at the library, but I have a feeling that they're not ordering it for me until I pay my fines. Hopefully I can manage that in time to pick out some Christmas presents!





Speaking of which, I wandered over to the grand opening sale of a new LYS in N. Portland yesterday afternoon to do a little early Xmas shopping. It is a really cute little store - I just wish it was closer to me. I live in the one part of town with no yarn stores! The place is called The Naked Sheep Knit Shop. I couldn't resist buying a few things (including not-pictured makings for a gift for someone who reads this blog). I got this cute bag with my purchase and a bumper sticker, to make it so my husband is even more embarassed to drive the minivan around.

I just set the cow out to block. It was so curly, I decided to block before finishing (I've always done it after), and I think I'm a convert. It will be nice to seam pieces that are flat and the shape they're supposed to be... A few places on the cow turned out a little gnarly, but not bad for my first attempt at this much intarsia. I did discover while measuring out my pieces that the pattern text and the schematic don't match (the schematic tacked the ribbing on as add'l length, but the pattern did not). So, everything is a little shorter than it's supposed to be. Lesson learned - look at the schematic before you start, not after you finish!

Time for my favorite baby chore - tying up the bag of last week's dirty diapers and putting them out for the diaper service. Bill snuck out without doing it again. Ah, the joys of having children. We never used to argue about the mundane.

The sock that wasn't quite...

If you go back a few posts, you'll see my speculation as to whether or not a teeny tiny ball of yarn was going to be enough to finish the foot and toe of a teeny tiny baby sock. Well...I decided that our trip to the beach yesterday was the perfect time to find out. You can see from the picture here that I was able to finish the foot and about half of the short rows for the bottom of the toe. I was stupidly optimistic even as the ball shrunk to the size of a grape... "It's thin yarn, and tiny needles - it just might make it!" The thought even crossed my mind to trim the extra inches off of the loose ends and try to knit them into the rest of the toe, but I abandoned that foolish plan once I really thought it through - would an additional foot of yarn really get me through the half top of the toe and the bind-off? Yeah - I don't think so.

Yesterday we took a too-long-in-coming trip out to the Oregon coast so my brother-in-law could teach my husband how to surf. The water was a chilly 55 degrees, so I wisely decided I would sit in the sun and knit instead. It turned out to be a beautiful if slightly windy day, and the kids had a blast (which kept them from pestering me while I was knitting, for the most part). Bill even managed to get three really good and several shorter well-started-but-poorly-ended
rides in. He's now threatening to take up regular surfing, which I will encourage as long as he stays in little surf away from man-eating sharks. If you want to see the full photo spread from our fabulous day, click here. I also added an Albums section in the sidebar and will post more pictures there as I continue to get organized, so check back soon for more.

On the way home, to soothe my hurt from the sock that didn't quite make it, I started yet another of Ann Budd's little sock patterns, this one with a braided cable running down the front. I really love the short-row technique for the toe and heel, and they are so teeny that they knit up really fast and don't take up much room in my bag. We'll see if Owen ever actually wears them, but I do enjoy making them!

On a final note, while re-reading some of my earlier posts, I realized that I do a lot of complaining about the kids. This is true in my real-life conversation as well, but it only reflects my sorry attempt to keep a little distance from them since I love them so fiercely that losing one of them would be like losing myself. No, it would be worse. They spend a lot of time driving me crazy, but it is all forgotten in the moments when Sydney climbs into my lap and curls up to watch tv, or Owen falls asleep on my shoulder with his velvety little cheek tucked into the crook of my neck. These kids are the finest thing I've ever produced, and while the day-to-day mundane can certainly make life less magical, my little optimists always manage to find, if just for a moment, a way to make the day instantly brighter.

Intarsia help!

Here is my intarsia color bleed-through for you Knitty Coffeeshop folk who are kind enough to be taking a look... As you can see, especially w/ the hooves (this is a cow, if you hadn't already figured that out), there isn't much room to be weaving black under black, which is why I branched out under the other colors.

Thanks!!!

TGFIL (Thank God For In-Laws)

This is a really old picture (as you can tell from how small Owen is), but it's the most recent one I have of my lovely parents-in-law and their grandchildren. Just to give you a little background, my husband and I met on a blind date set up by none other than our mothers, who were friends. We got married five years ago, and have been serial movers ever since. We started out in Minnesota (where we're from), moved to Atlanta for a year, then to LA for a couple of years. We went through four houses (purchased), two rentals and several residence hotels (while waiting for various closings). Meanwhile, Bill and Sue were happily living in Eugene, OR. Finally, when I was pregnant with Owen, we decided that Southern CA was not for us now that we weren't swinging DINKs anymore (as in, Dual Income No Kids). My mom begged us to come back to MN while Bill & Sue bit their lips and silently hoped we would settle in Oregon. We decided that we just couldn't hack midwestern winters (or mosquito-filled summers) anymore and made the move to Portland. Shortly after we got here, B&S started looking for houses in the Portland suburbs to be closer to us (my brother-in-law Chris and his wife Katie also live in PDX). As fate would have it, they found a decent little house with a humongous yard that is only 2.5 miles from us (and seven blocks from Chris & Katie).

So, to make a long story a little less long, we LOVE Portland. It is a truly rockin' city and is just crawling with knitters and cool LYSs like Mabel's and The Yarn Garden. Plus, with the grandparents' house so close, we actually have easy-access babysitting on the rare occasion that we have a date night or I have a place to go when the kids are driving me crazy and I need someone else for them to pester before I strangle them both. Sue is a great cook, an avid gardener and an amazing quilter. Bill is a former national park ranger and an authority on all things nature, hiking, and (of course) national parks. I just adore them both! (And to help explain any confusion in past/future posts, my hubby's name is also Bill.)

Okay, now that I am done gushing about the in-laws (the kids and I spent about five hours there yesterday being entertained and pampered), on to some knitting:


Here is another project that I knitted while on vacation in MN - a soon-to-be-felted bag. This is another Knitty Gritty project and knitted up super fast on size 11 needles with bulky Baabajoes Woolpak yarn. It kinda looks like a cute little halter top, too, doesn't it? That might be a project idea for next summer, assuming I'm not still married to my nursing bra...

I'm hoping to get the thing felted on Sunday - I will keep you posted on the progress. Then the fun begins - needle felting a cute little flower motif on the front. I've never needle felted, but it sounds dangerous and pretty fun. The needles sure are vicious looking - kind of like teeny little whale harpoons.

Also, I will be updating my previous posts w/ some links, so if you want some awesome free patterns, check them out.

Teeny tiny baby feet

Here are some of my newest creations for those teeny tiny little feet (that woke me up at 6 am this morning and didn't go back to sleep for over an hour, at which point I was wide awake and thus here I am...). The top pair of "sandals" is from the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino book. I had almost an entire skein left after knitting up the blanket, so I decided to see if I had enough for these, too. I did - yay! Now I just need to sew the buttons on the straps and wait for Owen's feet to grow enough to fit into them. By that point, he'll probably be old enough that he just kicks them off right away anyway. Oh, well, it was all about the process, right?

The other pair of baby socks was from the summer Interweave Knits. As you can see, I still need to weave the ends in. I knit these up pretty quickly during our recent trip to Minnesota since we had several hours in the car. I was pleasantly surprised at my ability to knit in the car without getting sick - I have to make my husband pull over every time I need to read a map, but apparently knitting doesn't use the same receptors or something.


So, I loved making that first pair of tiny purple socks so much, I decided I'd do another with the second half of the yarn hank. The pattern said that each hank should make three pairs of socks. Mistake one - I used a different yarn than the one they used for the pattern. Same weight, but different yarn. Mistake two - I skipped the swatch. Yes, I know, I know, bad Chrissy. I generally knit tighter than the average bear, so I usually have to go up a couple needle sizes. The LYS didn't have the size 0 needles that the pattern called for, so I bought the size 2 that they did have and figured that would be good enough. Besides, his feet are only going to get bigger, right? So, now I am left with the teeny tiny ball of yarn that you can see in the picture. Who wants to place bets - will I make it through the rest of the 2nd sock with the yarn I have left? I think that I'm going to try, just for the hell of it. But, I don't think I'm going to make it... It's all about the process, right? Right.

Okay, obligatory cute baby pic for the family folks who are reading this and don't care much about my knitting problems... We tried to get him to smile for this but could only get this deer-in-the-headlights look out of him. We still think he's pretty darn cute.

Moo!

I love this little intarsia cow sweater that I'm knitting for Sydney, but can I say that I HATE INTARSIA!!! I love the results, but the process sucks big time. Maybe it was because the pattern that I was working off of was teeny tiny, and I didn't use a ruler or anything to keep track of where I was (oh, no, I can handle it), so I ended up ripping out a couple of rows three different times. Maybe it was the fact that I forgot to bind off the armholes and had to rip out four rows to get back to where they were supposed to be. Maybe it's because I didn't leave myself enough yarn in a couple different places and in one spot, by the time I was done, I only had about an inch and a half of tail left and had to actually TIE A KNOT instead of weaving the end in... Okay, deep breath... I am delighted about how it turned out, and I'm just going to hope that the knot doesn't untie itself before she grows out of it. Now we'll see if I can motivate myself to finish the solid-color, stockinette sleeves and actually put the thing together (now that the "fun" part is done).

Is it normal that my 2-1/2 year old daughter is currently in the kitchen crying her eyes out because I won't feed her applesauce to her? She has known how to use a spoon for at least a year and a half...



We FINALLY got some rain last night! I can't remember the last time it rained, other than it was a long time ago. However, I somehow managed to remember to water enought that my winter peas and beans actually came up! Look at them! I am so proud. The only problem spot is in the 2nd row of peas - we hosted a playgroup in our backyard right before they sprouted and a few of them got trampled. Oh, well! I was so happy that they came up at all. My next target is a few rows of winter lettuce and spinach.

Well, Sydney managed to eat all of her applesauce all by herself. The mysterious fever has left us, but Owen had a terrible night last night. Probably because he slept all day yesterday... It's another Diet Coke for breakfast kind of day for me. It seemed like he was awake more than he slept, but maybe that was just me.

Okay, the baby is chewing on my arm and Sydney is screaming at me from the kitchen - time to go! Ah, the joys of parenthood.

The little monsters

Here is my favorite picture of the small ones. It perfectly reflects life at our house. My mom is the one trying to pull Owen's shirt off...

Pretty cute, aren't they?

Some of my latest creations

Ah, socks. If you can believe it, this was my first pair of socks. They were always so intimidating (all those needles), but then I saw these made on an episode of DIY's Knitty Gritty (great show, if you've never seen it - they make some really cute stuff and I've got a few other things in progress that I got from the show). After seeing how they were done, I thought, "I can do that". And I did! They were pretty darn easy, actually, and they're knit in Berroco Pleasure which I absolutely loved working with except for the fact that it made my nose really itchy. Good thing these will be on my feet! My husband likes them so much that he's been pestering me for a pair. Ironically, I knit these heavy things on some of the hottest days of summer.

Here is another one of my latest knit creations - an entrelac baby shawl for my son. It's from a Debbie Bliss pattern and knitted in Baby Cashmerino. I loved the yarn in the skein, but I'm not so crazy about it knitted up - the blanket is gorgeous but really heavy and not nearly as soft as I thought it was going to be. Oh, well. That's my fault for getting all excited, buying all the yarn at once, and knitting the thing without making the dreaded swatch. I could've saved myself $70 in yarn! Oh, well. It was fun to learn entrelac and it's a good piece to show off with. I don't see my son dragging this around as his banky for the next four years, however...

Well, I have two sick, cranky kids today so I'm not sure how much knitting will be done. They both came down with fevers yesterday afternoon - god only knows what they picked up. The only good thing about it is they both sleep more than usual when sick. This is the first high fever that the baby has had, and it of course makes me a little nervous, but he seems to be doing fine. The girl has had a gazillion fevers, most for no apparent reason. I'm sure we'll be seeing even more of them when she starts preschool in the fall and drags home everything under the sun. I just keep telling myself that what doesn't kill them only makes them stronger!

Now, time for breakfast and some Blue's Clues...

On the Bandwagon

Well, I've decided to jump on the blogging bandwagon, especially since I have so many things knit to talk about lately. I just gorged myself at the trough of the Yarn Garden yesterday and have about seven projects that I am working on or planning to start. I am also gearing up a few submissions to send out in the next couple of months. Plus I need to spend nearly all my free time mommying my 2 year old and my 4 month old. Whew! We'll see how much time I actually have to blog, but I always seem to find time to knit or surf the 'net. I just prioritize these things above doing laundry, cleaning the kitchen, vaccuming, etc...